Ruengoethe

The Chirurgeon

“All these slits…these women…they’ve a void in them, and in this place is the whole of life and death…a birthing tomb, a gateway. There must be more to it…”
-from the Journals of Norelli Ilmedico

Known as Norelli Ilmedico in life, The Chirurgeon is an Anathem who is still the focus of some cults.

Norelli Ilmedico was a nobleman, the nephew of a doge, and trained in the medical arts as well as the art of Tuning. In his youth Norelli was a devout, and considered becoming a cleric, but was expelled for the faith school in his first year after he was accused of the rape of a fellow student. After, he enrolled in a school for sellspells run by an Apsaran headmaster who took Norelli under his personal tutelage. He had particular interest in Magebreeding and anatomy, using his wealth and political connections to acquire exotic beasts to vivisect and human corpses, especially of women, to dissect. His woodcuts of the female reproductive system are still used in medical education. His carvings were done not in the standard method of drawing anatomical charts, but imitated the illustrations found in illuminated manuscripts.

At some point of his life, Norelli started experimenting with Tekne, though where he learned the craft is still unknown. He moved out into his own small manor for these experiments, at the edge of the city of Rise, where he also is said to have engaged in necrophilia and torture. He used prostitutes he lured to his home to sacrifice and fuel his magics. He became obsessed with the notion of Ascension, and to this end he created the Cambion, a breed of terrifying liminals, to worship him. In the end his creations devoured him and proliferated throughout the world. But, he did ascend, an event witnessed from those in the farmland surrounding his manor. The church investigated his home, and, finding the twisted experiments and journals of the chirurgeon, they immediately declared him anathem. The cambion were not found within the manor, having escaped into the world.